The Stopped Heart (21 page)

“What?”

“I said come here.”

When he doesn't move, she reaches over and takes the remote from his hand, turning off the TV. Moving herself onto him, astride him. Feeling beneath her the tired trousers, the worn linen shirt, their colors and textures so familiar as to have almost become a part of him.

Blindly, eyes half-closed, he reaches up and touches her. A finger on her breast, then her waist—once ten pounds too soft, now taut, defined by grief.

As she feels the first stirrings of something, he looks up at her.

“What's all this, then?”

His face is kind. Baffled. A stranger's face.

She says nothing. She bends and kisses him. He lets her do it. He doesn't say anything. Doesn't do anything. She can't decide if it matters. She doesn't know what it is that she wants him to do.

Upstairs, a door bangs shut. Mary stops, her hands still on him.

“What was that?”

“What was what?”

“Upstairs. You didn't hear it?”

Graham looks at her.

“What do you think you heard?”

Mary strains, still listening.

“I don't know,” she says. “It sounded like a door. Ruby's room, or—”

“Well, it couldn't be.”

“I know.”

Graham reaches up to her, his hands searching her face, his thumb on her lip.

“Hey. Don't stop. I was enjoying that.”

“Were you?”

Mary hesitates, still listening to the house.

“Yes,” he says. “I was.”

T
HAT NIGHT, FOR THE FIRST TIME IN A VERY LONG TIME, SHE
dreams of Ella. Ella undressed and ready for a bath. Water crashing from the taps in the bathroom across the landing. Ella, naked and happily clamped on her hip, the sensation of that small body against hers, its springy weight, its solid, curving warmth. The dream is long, unhurried. It seems to go on and on. More than once she lets her lips drift over that downy hair, breathing it in, staying there, leaving herself there, nowhere else she'd rather be.

In fact, the sensation of not having to hurry, of having time, is so intense that when she wakes she does not weep but just lies there. Afraid to move or even breathe in case she dislodges the feeling that is washing over her. A feeling that she had imagined was lost to her forever. Not loss or grief or even anger. Just, quite simply, love.

I
WAS VERY ANGRY WITH
J
AMES AND
I
TOLD HIM SO.
I
TOLD HIM
he should not have given Jazzy a cigarette.

Why not?

Because she's too young.

What's it to you, Eliza? Isn't it her business what she does?

She's a child, I said. She's ten years old. She doesn't know a single thing about anything.

He smiled.

Ah, well, but she probably knows a lot more than you think.

Don't speak about her like that.

Like what?

I don't know.

You don't know?

I just don't like the way you talk about her, that's all.

James stared at me for a moment and I stared back. I tried hard to think what it was that I didn't like. A lot of my energy was having to go into hating him, and a part of me thought of how much easier it would be just to give in and beg him to slide his hand inside my dress so I could feel his fingers on the keen and shivery point of my breast the way I used to. He gave me a look then as if he could see right inside my head.

Just because you're afraid to try new things, he said.

What? What's that meant to mean?

He said nothing, just looked at me hard and then laughed again.

You're an innocent, Eliza. Even more than all those kiddies, I'm telling you. You've no idea. It's you who's the child. You're the one who knows nothing at all.

I looked at him. He was still smiling.

It's all right, he said. Don't worry about it. It's why I like you. It's why I like you best of all of them. It's why you're my girl.

I'm not your girl.

Whatever you say.

F
RANK WAS BURIED IN THE EVENING AS THE LIGHT WAS GOING
and the birds were calling and the cows were coming home.

My mother didn't go and the little ones weren't allowed. It was just my father and Jazzy and me. I don't know if James would have cared to be there or not, but my father needed him to bring the cows in. He told my father that he would look in on my mother and take her a cup of tea.

I looked in the hole before they put him in. Poor Frank. I didn't like to think of him going down into that deep and murky darkness all alone. I wished the dog could have gone in with him, but my father had already put her in the woods.

Afterward, my father would not speak. His face was white and his hands trembled and he would not say a word to anyone. We went home and he pulled up a chair in the kitchen and sat with his head in his hands. I asked him if he wanted a cup of tea and he said he didn't, he said he didn't want anything. He said I didn't need to sit with him either, but I was afraid to leave him there all alone. So I sat and watched the back of his head and I saw him wipe his face a couple of times. After that he had a smoke and then I think he went up to bed and there I was, left alone with my thoughts.

At last Jazzy came in. I saw that she'd been crying. I felt sorry for her and I put out my hand and she came over and took it, trying to plait my fingers as she liked to do, twisting them over and over each other, till I said ouch and pulled my hand away.

Jazzy looked at me. Her hair was in rats' tails and the tears had made her face dirty. She had on her oldest, most torn chemise. She was fidgeting and scratching at the tops of her legs.

I've got boobies, she said. Look.

And she put her two hands in the place where anyone could see there was only little girl's hard flatness.

Don't be silly, Jazz, I said. Of course you haven't. What are you saying that for?

But I have. Look. They're growing, aren't they, Eliza?

She bunched them up again with her hands, trying her best to make something of them. I didn't know what she was on about.

They're not growing, I said. Not yet. You're too young.

She gazed at me.

But I'm a woman, aren't I? she said.

I shook my head.

You're ten years old. You're nowhere near being a woman.

But I am. James Dix said I am.

What do you mean, James said you are? What's James been saying?

She bit her lip.

He said I wasn't to tell you.

Wasn't to tell me what?

Nothing, she said, and the look on her face was hard and tight and ugly.

At that moment there was a knock on the door, but before either of us could go to it, it opened and Phoebe Harkiss came in. She had an armful of flowers. She stood there for a moment, looking at us both.

From my ma, she said.

It's a bit late for flowers, I said.

I know. I was supposed to bring them earlier.

I did not move. I could not be bothered with Phoebe Harkiss right now.

All right, I said. You can put them in the sink.

Phoebe looked at me for a moment, then she went over and put them there, but after she'd done it she did not seem to want to go. She stood there looking at both of us with a smirk on her face.

So is it true? she said.

Is what true?

About your ma.

What about her?

She rolled her eyes and glanced at a corner of the room.

That she's up the spout again?

I lifted my head and stared at her.

She's not! Jazzy said.

Phoebe smiled, enjoying our surprise. Her face splattered with freckles and the eyes so lacking in color they made you feel queasy.

Our ma almost died from the last one, I said. She's not having another one as long as she lives.

Phoebe cast her eyes over me.

It's not what they're saying in the village.

What are they saying in the village? Jazzy said.

Phoebe sighed. She looked over at where the flowers were and she made a worried, fussing face that anyone could see she'd just copied from women in the village.

I don't want to upset you, she said.

Either tell us at once or shut up about it, I said.

She shrugged.

Well, I suppose you ought to ask James about it.

Jazzy stared at her.

Why would we want to ask him?

Phoebe looked at her for a long moment and then, as if she couldn't contain it any longer, she laughed.

J
UNE.
T
HE WEATHER CONTINUES HOT AND DRY.
D
ECIDING AT
last to tackle the garden, Graham and Mary drive off together to a garden center. About nine miles down the A12, three or four roundabouts, and a turning off to the left. Very well signposted, Deborah said it was.

Mary's made a list of what they need. Compost, mulch. A long hose on a reel to fix to the tap in the yard. Some good-quality pruning shears. A rake. Perhaps a plant or two.

“We could even see if there's any decent garden furniture,”
Graham says as they drive around looking for a space in the busy, dusty car park.

They take a trolley, pushing it off past the wood and laminate and paint aisles, past the barbecues and parasols and lawn mowers. Then they stand together out in the dappled sunshine of the gardening section, wiping crumbs of black compost off on their jeans, trying to decide if it's crazy to plant a climber—honeysuckle or clematis—in the middle of what some are saying might turn out to be a heat wave.

“We'll just have to be very good about watering it,” Mary says. She catches him smiling at her.

“What?”

“Just—it's nice. To hear you talking like that.”

They decide on a jasmine and a clematis, as well as some small shrubs and a rose with blooms that are neither pink nor gold but somehow in between.

They spend at least ten minutes choosing a proper hose with all the different, complicated attachments. And then they look briefly at tables and chairs but agree that none of them are very nice.

“We should ask Deborah,” Graham says.

“Why Deborah?”

“She knows all those antiques people. She'll know where we can get something old.”

Mary thinks about this.

“Old chairs are never really all that comfortable,” she says.

“All right, but a table? I don't know what you call comfortable. Maybe we should think about getting another swing seat.”

She stares at him.

“A swing seat?”

“Like the one we used to have. Didn't you used to have a thing about swing seats?”

A sudden memory of their old, green-and-white-striped swing seat flying high. Small bare feet sticking out of it. The vivid lawn, homemade ices, the spray of the sprinkler. Laughter—

“Seeds,” she says. “We need seeds.”

She picks out rocket, parsley, basil, coriander, three or four types of salad and bok choi.

“Bok choi? Do we grow bok choi?”

“Never. That's why I'm getting it.”

He leans over and pulls her to him, kisses her hair. She feels his arms around her.

“I don't think I'd want another swing seat,” she says.

“I know,” he says. “I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking. I shouldn't have said it. I know that.”

T
HEY DECIDE THAT HE'LL JOIN THE LONG LINE TO PAY WHILE SHE
goes and gets the car. Out there in the car park, she walks fast, keeping her eyes fixed on the horizon. Wisps of clouds in a bluest of blue skies. Grayish blur of woodland sloping toward the road.

She gets into the car. Her face smacked by the sudden thick heat inside. Rolling down the windows, putting the key in, she drives it slowly round, avoiding the people pushing trolleys, waiting for a space to pull in, getting as close to the entrance as she can.

She turns off the engine then and waits, hands loose in her lap, looking out for him.

It's only as she sees him coming with the trolley, frowning a little as he struggles to get it down the ramp, that she understands what is happening to her. She grabs the box of tissues off the backseat just in time. Wipes at her face and thrusts the balled-up tissue into her bag moments before he pulls open the door.

“OK?” His hands are on the trolley as he smiles down at her, wanting the key to the boot.

“Yes,” she tells him, smiling back and realizing it's not a lie.

I
WAS LYING IN MY BED WHEN HE CAME TO ME.
H
ALF-ASLEEP IN
the early-morning shadows, my eyes barely managing to open, I saw the door move—hot fear and surprise slicing through me—but before I could even cry out, he was right there beside me, his weight pinning the sheets, his hand on my mouth.

Swear to me you won't cry out, he whispered. Swear it?

I tried to nod, but he was crushing me so hard I could not gasp or speak or breathe, let alone move my head. Slowly, he removed the hand. I licked my lips. And was about to ask him what he thought he was doing when he gave a sigh and put his head in his hands.

I'm all undone, he said.

What?

You heard me. All night, I've just lain there in the barn, weeping and sobbing like a little child. I came to tell you I can't do it anymore, Eliza. I thought I could do it but I can't. I just love you far too much. I'll be whatever you want me to be. Anything you want, anything you ask, I'll do it. I fall asleep thinking of you and I wake up thinking of you. The taste of you is in my mouth, on my tongue, in my heart, I don't care what you say, everything around me—the sky, the fields, the birds, even the damnable, dratted cows, Eliza—when I look at them, all I can think about is you.

I gazed at him. I felt quite afraid. I did not think he had ever said so many words all together in all the time I had known him. I was about to try to answer him, but he threw me a look of such unbearable gentleness then that I felt a pain somewhere deep inside me, I wasn't sure where.